Before Gimmas' feeble radiance departed completely, Lieutenant Wilf Ansor Brim, I.F., climbed from his perch and began picking his way back among the rocks toward the shore. Around him, little remained in view except the empty wharf, the pounding water—and the snow, which by now had grown into a hissing blizzard. He shrugged as he walked—none of the dirty weather mattered. He was nicely warmed from within. He had part of Margot now. And somewhere halfway across the galaxy, Collingswood's new ship waited—with a whole different kind of "pick and shovel" warfare for him to master. He touched the comet on his collar—he'd come a long way to get that. Not much more an ex-miner could ask for, now, was there?
As he neared the shore, he spied two figures making their way toward him through the snow—a large man and an even larger Bear waving what could only be a colossal bottle of...meem! The three met in the last moments of daylight, passing the bottle among themselves and clapping one another on the back in great apparent hilarity. Then arm in arm, they started landward and disappeared into the driving snowstorm singing, "To ice, to snow, to Sodeskaya we go!" over and over again until their voices merged with the howling wind and pounding surf. Not long afterward, the quiet flakes covered their tracks in a soft, uniform mantle of white.
Table of Contents
THE HELMSMAN
BY BILL BALDWIN
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10